Ed Broadbent: Opposing Academic Expresson, Freedoms at the University of Ottawa

I see, it appears as part of the letterhead, here: http://rancourt.academicfreedom.ca/Data/Documents/ccla/2010-02-25=CCLA-L...

I think this is the professor who has challenged educational orthodoxy so much that his own colleagues are intimidated by him. He has, however, backed up his actions with his own research. Babblers should not reject, without much thought, what this particular prof is doing.

There's more info about this which I will try to find.

Yea, it really belongs as an educational issue thread. If Broadbent is playing an ignorant role here, it's still only a secondary point. What the academic is doing, why he is doing it, what repressive measures have been taken against him, and what can be done to help him, etc., are the important matters.

Me too Sean....

I disagree with Snert and BillBC. The A+ thing was a thinly-veiled pretext for getting rid of someone who made the bigshots feel uncomfortable. Anyway, I've given my views at length on this issue and they haven't changed. I do, however, think that it's a little silly to go after Ed Broadbent here.

I think this case is fascinating.  People spring to the defence of this guy mostly, as far as I can see, because he "challenges authority."  But some traditional ways are good, and I think this guy's ideas are simply nutty, even if he has done what he calls research on them.  Snert's analogy of the home economics course is perfect, I think

The Senate certainly doesn't tell faculty what they may or may not say.  They do, however, make decisions about course management (including:  is a course graded or not).  You seem to be implying that university professors are being gagged by the tyranny of the majority.  To someone who works at a university, that's hilarious.

Also, a quick reminder that the Senate is not some kind of "other" to faculty.  There are faculty representatives on the Senate, as well as staff and students.  I somehow doubt that those faculty representatives are going to drive the Senate to silence academics!

I'll put you down as voting against student representation in these decisions.

You can't have total freedom to teach any way you want.  I knew a college teacher who decided that lecturing was unnecessary--he told the students to read this and that, and to come to his office if they had any questions.  Not surprisingly the course was a disaster, and most students learned nothing.  There has to be some control on this sort of thing.

Well, BillBC, are you saying teachers have to teach students? I'd agree with that. Any evidence that Rancourt didn't do that?

If the Senate decides that every student in a class has to be ranked at the end of the course, individually and publicly, with no ties - and a lecturer said, "I will never do such a thing" - would you fire her?

Yes, I'm saying that teachers have to teach students, and further, that part of teaching is assessing, and that giving all students A+ is not assessing, but just a mockery of assessing.  Rancourt himself provides the evidence.

No Senate would require students to be publicly assessed.  The privacy laws forbid it.  You can't even post student grades by number.  But if your question is, would I fire a lecturer who refused to rank (grade?) students at the end of the course, I'd say yes, of course.

It seems that pass/fail grading is not actually binary - it's actually a four-level system, at least as far as Harvard is concerned.  Which means there is still ranking, and it's much like the grading that was used, IIRC, in the early 1980s at a regional university I attended (the grades were 1 through 4).

http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2008/9/26/harvard-law-school-adopts-pa...

It looks to me like Racourt is more interested in raising a ruckus and getting into fights with people than he is on teaching. A university can't just stop grading students, all degrees would be meaningless. Rancourt is being unreasonable.

If an institution wants to get rid of grades for a particular course, they can always offer it as non-credit.

If this is really about "learning" (and I'm not convinced it is) then the lack of a credit won't matter at all.  How is a "credit" any better than a "grade" anyway? 

I wonder if Rancourt ever suggested that option?

Notwithstanding partials, the traditional system is only one more -- five -- level: A, B, C, D and F.

I guess "honors pass" = A, "pass" = C, "low pass" = D and "fail" = F. Anyway, unless Rancourt ever issued a "fail", it's a moot point. His appeared to be a guaranteed pass, conditional only upon shining a seat with your ass.

It's only blaming the victim if you accept that he is, actually, a victim.  I'm not so convinced he's a victim of anything more than his own pugnacious attitude.

Getting a BA or not is not the point.  Where you are ranked, how well you understand the course materials, what courses you've taken and the level of work you've accomplished may not be recorded on the sheepskin, but they're part of your transcripts and this is presented and factored in for any post-grad programs one might apply to.  Just as your high school grades are taken into account in your application to an undergrad program. 

Besides which, I just think it's wrong that the student who works his or her ass off in school and does well should get the same grade as some schmuck who phones it in.  It diminishes the achievement.

ETA:  If Rancourt doesn't want to work within the system, then he shouldn't.  But you can't have your cake (in his case, tenured position, salary and pension) and eat it, too. 

Harvard may have a pass/fail system, but it screens students carefully before letting them in.  It has a very high standard of admission, so all of its students are likely to achieve much the same result.  The U of O, on the other hand, depends on highly inflated high school grades, which are pretty much meaningless.  So it's easy to get into the place, and apparently impossible to fail his class unless you screw up in some non-academic way. 

Grading is not (just) about training zombies for industry, it's about ranking students by their abilities.  How could any of his students get into graduate school?  Their GPA may not be written on their diplomas, but they certainly appear on their transcripts, which a graduate admissions office will want to see.  If a graduate school finds out a student took this guy's course, the grade will be totally discounted--a kiss of death for the student.

Rancourt has a long record of activism and attempting to affect the increasingly corporatized environment of the modern university. How would those who advocate a "like it or lump it" approach suggest those who are concerned about the direction Canadian universities are willingly taking work to effect change?

Most pre-requisites are core courses that students in a chosen program will have to take regardless.  The pre-req isn't there to make entry to a core course more challenging, it's there to ensure that you take courses in the proper order.

Also, this is the guy who had two ten year old children in his course.  That doesn't exactly speak to the difficulty of getting in.  LOL!

Now you try again.

You'll have to substantiate this claim. What course? etc.Of course, if you're just making stuff up, then carry on. lol.

That argument only works if the prereq's grade conventionally - so Rancourt would be the only one not having to deal with "quality control". 

"academic freedom goes beyond simply what to research (within the narrow confines of the university-industrial complex) - it should include how things are taught as well."

--it may go beyond it, but not infinitely.  You can imagine all sorts of weird approaches that no one here would approve of.  Someone has to set limits....

And refusing to grade his students ties into this how?  It's more likely to screw over his students than it is to create any kind of positive change. 

The truth is, university professors have far more professional autonomy (which, by the way, is the proper term for it, not "academic freedom") in the classroom than any of us will ever have in our workplace (unless, of course, we're professors).

But course management is the job of the institution, via an elected, cross-representational committee, not of individuals going on their gut feelings.

I reiterate my amusement at seeing the progressives arguing that important academic decisions about course management should be the privelege of one already priveleged individual rather than of an elected group of faculty, staff and students.  Srsly.  Look at what you're rooting for.

First of all, Rancourt is being disingenuous. His job description also does not say "Is responsible for all matters of course management" either. So, please. Give us a break.

But regarding a genuine belief that some or all courses should be graded differently, that can be brought to the Senate for consideration.

Do you trust an elected body of staff, faculty and students to decide something like this? Yes or no?

Courses are already designed by individual lecturers and professors, not by the senate--for obvious reasons: one is an expert in the field and the other isn't.

Edited to address Snert's edit:

Of course I would prefer an elected and representative body like a University Senate to make choices before individual "cranks." I consider Rancourt an activist, and the U of O Senate has proven itself to be disinterested in discourse--that is to say, it isn't interested in democracy. Rather than address Rancourt's subversive concerns, it has chosen to remove a tenured professor from doing what he is trained to do, and, indeed, what the University claims it wants for its students. Make no mistake: Rancourt taught two small senior-level courses which were not prerequisites. What irrevocable damage are these two classes doing to the University that necessitates such an unprecedented move on the part of the University executive?

Correct.  The faculty member will be a subject matter expert.  If their subject is Modern Cinema then they should be expected to know all about Modern Cinema.

But the subject and course management are two different things.  One -- the subject -- is what is taught.  The other -- course management -- is how.  I trust everyone is aware that most PhDs will have limited, if any formal training in teaching their subject.  The "comps" (comprehensives) that they write prior to thesis work are intended only to demonstrate master of the subject matter.

Hehe. "Snert-like utterances"??

While you and I will always disagree on many things, I have to, whether I like it or not, accept that in matters of unions and labour relations, you simply know more than I do. It's your world, so to speak, and not so much mine.

This is what I do. This is what I know. It's a shame you're not humble enough to see when you should step back (or, do your homework). Around about the time that I had to explain the concept of the Senate to you should have been when you got a little more humble. And yet here you are, unable to step back, unable to be quiet, pontificating on a subject that frankly you know very little about.

The remark on the two 10 year olds is from Wikipedia. There is no citation whatsoever.

If it's in Wikipedia does that make it true? lol. I can just imagine what sort of academic Snert would make. lol lol lol

Their names are Sebastian and Douglas Foster.  Here's their own web page.

Let me know when you think you're ready to do this for yourself.

And similarly, I can picture what kind of student you would.

"Spoon feed me! Someone SPOON FEED ME!!"

I'm not sure that Rancourt simply doing as he wishes is democracy, nor do I have some specific reason to believe that UofO is disinterested in discourse around grading. This, to me, is like one person sending a letter to the Prime Minister demanding an end to hospital wait times, and upon receiving neither a letter back, nor zero hospital wait times, declaring the the PM has no interest in health care.

A university that gives away an A+ to every student who enrols has as much credibility as a sporting competition that encourages steroid use.

Interesting factoid: Rancourt's course WAS approved, BY THE SENATE, to run as pass/fail. I'll let N. Beltov post that; he could use the practice.

I reserve the right to all the contempt for radical politics I want.

As for exaggeration, you're really telling me that that's dragging this thread down, and not, say, the massive, embarrasing amount of misinformation paired with inexplicable self-confidence?  If anything -- and I'm not being sarcastic when I say this -- I have a new empathy for posters like Unionist who have to deal with idjits ignorantly asserting that Unions "have to protect members who sleep on the job" or other nonsense that's easily corrected by someone who knows.

To whatever degree you agree or believe that I have some genuine knowledge of how universities work, do you believe that the posters in this thread have been treating that knowledge in good faith?  For a thread about learning, has it been your impression that people want to learn more about this?  I think most of Rancourt's supporters have their minds made up, and it's on the basis of his politics, not on the basis of their understanding of the inner workings of higher education.

I call these "arguments to bias": you merely have that opinion because you hold those beliefs. Essentially, someone asserts that there is "political bias" operative above and beyond the evidenced facts, unreasonably swaying someone's opinion. What is missing is that a persons political views (their "bias") may be shaped by their interpretation of the evidence.

It is not an argument. It is a tautological debating ploy intended to finesse an argument without actually presenting a case.

Firstly, to assert that pedagogy needs a formalized system of grading flies in the face of the fact that this would mean that the greatest part of "higher learning" would have to thrown into the wastebasket, since most of it predates systems of grading. In fact "grading" is actually a very new phenomena, and basis of today's higher learning rests upon work produced in an environment without grading. Grading, as a fundamental part of the educational process was invented in the late 18th century, and didn't come into common practice until the beginning of the 19th century.

Albert Einstien, Neils Bohr, Francis Crick, Adam Smith, Hegel and Charles Darwin were never seriously subject to a comprehensive, and standardized system of grading like we know today in our educational institutions -- not even close. We know for a fact that Copernicus and Galileo were not. Never mind Plato.

Standardized grading, in terms of the uniform report card was not introduced in the United States until about 1910. Then as now, its primary function has been to create bureaucratic efficiency, it is not primarily a teaching aid of any kind. It actually has very little to do with pedagogy at all. It is about evaluating the results of pedagogy.

Secondly, the corporatization of higher learning is not some kind of "radical" left wing fantasy. It is something that corporations have loudly and proudly endeavoured to do. They have intervened in the political process to assert a model of education which has as it primary outcome the desire to create graduates who will be successful employee candidates. In fact, they regularly consult with Universities and School Boards to ensure that they are producing graduates with the right set of skills to meet their projected needs for the future labour force.

Grading, is an essential part of evaluating the quality of an employee candidate.

This is no secret: this is a conscious program, and one that is well advertized.

As someone pointed out before, giving A+ to all students is not necessarily worse than never giving an A+ to any student (the practice by several profs I know). Furthermore, while the university may have the right to demand adherence to certain grading standards,firing a faculty member for grade he has given in one class is ridiculous. Was this happened in more than one semester? Did he get any warning from his dean about it? If this was one occasion, his dean could simply appoint another faculty member to revise the marks.It is obvious his political views played the major role in the firing.

This is not really a CCLA issue though, but CAUT (Canadian Association of UNiversity Teachers). They are on his case. I wonder if their investigation has got anywhere:

http://www.caut.ca/news_details.asp?nid=1258&page=490

Not only did you manage to repeat what I said about "corporate" grading, but inadvertently, your comparison exactly underscores that chief pedagogic issue relating to systems of evaluation. There is a reason that an employer will almost always be first and foremost swayed bya good reference, rather than good grades, and this is because a performance evaluation from a previous employer will always take into account factors that simply can not be accounted for in a "grading" system.

For example, test scores and the grades that result from those test scores are entirely dependent on the ability to reproduce old methodology. For the most part they have nothing to do with an individuals ability to creatively confront old problems with new tools, or come up with new answers. So for example, a Physics exam based in Newtonian physics would likely fail Albert Einstein, because if he were to apply the General Theory of Relativity to such an exam, he would repeatedly come up with the wrong answers, even though we know they are right... or righter.

We might even be able to pose the idea that what we are really doing in modern university education is recreating a latter day version of Confucian Rote learning.

So, no, an employer evaluation is not a "grade". It is not a generic standardized test, which by its nature most exclude subjective evaluation in order to come up with a usable result. However, an employer evaluation, is much more akin to older systems of evaluating student performance based in "mentoring", where the two most important thing are the reputation of the person giving the evaluation and the their subjective evaluation of the students ability to perform to the standard that the mentor desires, and the advantage of this is obviously that creative and intuitive abilities, above and beyond the simple ability to repeat old methods in order to produce old results.

Whatever you think of that, the point is that there is substantial pedagogic justification for rejecting evaluations based in systemetized "objective" grading systems, and what Denis Rancourt is talking about and doing in his classes is not outside limits of what can be considered legitimate pedagogic discourse. It is just a different school of thought, being applied in the class room.

If one really wanted to get an evaluation of one of his students, and their ability to do any task at hand, one could easily call up Rancourt and ask for a reference.

Hello rabble babblers.

I get a sense that many of you would like the following links.

The main web site with background, media links, videos, arbitration ruling, outcomes of grievances, etc. in my academic freedom case.

My UofOWatch blog also has many relevant posts.

Those of you with a "limited" view of the legal concept of academic freedom might enjoy this document which is a legal report about an arbitration award in my case (also on the academic freedom site).

Enjoy.

Yes, thank you indeed for dropping by, Prof. Rancourt, and for the updated information. Please know that there are many here who have followed your story with sympathy and continue to do so. Here is a thread which points to much of the same information you have referred us to. And I'd like to wish you success in your struggle against persecution and for academic freedom!